guards will be useless, if few, and dangerous, if many.  No European nation can ever send against us such a regular army as we need fear, and it is hard, if our militia are not equal to those of Canada or Florida.  My idea then, is, that though proper exceptions to these general rules are desirable, and probably practicable, yet if the exceptions cannot be agreed on, the establishment of the rules, in all cases, will do ill in very few.  I hope, therefore, a bill of rights will be formed, to guard the people against the federal government, as they are already guarded against their State governments, in most instances.  The abandoning the principle of necessary rotation in the Senate, has, I see, been disapproved by many:  in the case of the President, by none.  I readily, therefore, suppose my opinion wrong, when opposed by the majority, as in the former instance, and the totality, as in the latter.  In this, however, I should have done it with more complete satisfaction, had we all judged from the same position.

Solicitations, which cannot be directly refused, oblige me to trouble you often with letters, recommending and introducing to you persons who go from hence to America.  I will beg the favor of you to distinguish the letters wherein I appeal to recommendations from other persons, from those which I write on my own knowledge.  In the former, it is never my intention to compromit myself or you.  In both instances, I must beg you to ascribe the trouble I give you, to circumstances which do not leave me at liberty to decline it.

I am, with very sincere esteem, Dear Sir, your affectionate friend and servant,

Th:  Jefferson.

LETTER CXLIX.—­TO JOHN JAY, August 3, 1788

TO JOHN JAY.

Paris, August 3, 1788.

Sir,

My last letters to you were of the 4th and 23d of May, with a Postscript of the 27th.  Since that, I have been honored with yours of April the 24th, May the 16th, and June the 9th.

The most remarkable internal occurrences since my last are these.  The Noblesse of Bretagne, who had received with so much warmth the late innovations in the government, assembled, and drew up a memorial to the King, and chose twelve members of their body to come and present it.  Among these was the Marquis de la Rouerie (Colonel Armand).  The King, considering the Noblesse as having no legal right to assemble, declined receiving the memorial.  The deputies, to give greater weight to it, called a meeting of the landed proprietors of Bretagne, resident at Paris, and proposed to them to add their signatures—­They did so, to the number of about sixty, of whom the Marquis de la Fayette was one.  The twelve deputies, for having called this meeting, were immediately sent to the Bastile where they now are, and the Parisian signers were deprived of such favors as they held of the court.  There were only four of them, however,